The Stupid-looking Fight Over 3D Glasses

3D glasses: As lucrative as they are dorky. No less than four companies are fighting for the privilege to make it seem like things are popping out of the screen at you during your favorite 3D films.

The companies—RealD, MasterImage 3D, Dolby Laboratories and XpanD—all boast different drawbacks and advantages, including 3D quality, price and comfort. But the best advantage of all seems to lie in the endorsement of "Avatar" director James Cameron. He's backed RealD. Some of these 3D glasses manufacturers seem to be a little too ambitious, though: XpanD's CEO envisions stylish 3D glasses becoming "your new ipod." Um, OK! [NYT]

•Poor MGM Studios. The former king of Old Hollywood is now on the auction block and it's looking pretty grim: MGM only released one movie this year—a remake of the musical "Fame"—and all its assets have been valued from between $1.5 billion and $2 billion. Which is about half of what Warner Brothers is claiming it will have made at the Box Office this year alone. [Variety]

•Yes, Warner Bros. is claiming a $3.99 billion box office take this year, which is a lot of money. In fact more money than it has ever made before. But Twentieth Century Fox says it has made more money: $4.07 billion worth of money. But Warner Bros. is like, "That's not fair because you're counting Searchlight Pictures, too, which is technically part of plain old Fox—not Twentieth Century." Guys, stop fighting: You both made a lot of money! [Variety]

•It appears that reality TV is not in fact taking over the world. Variety says that scripted dramas were what got the best ratings for basic cable—that includes new shows like USA's "Royal Pains," "White Collar" and FX's Burn Notice. Meanwhile MTV, the birthplace of reality, was down 10% in viewers this year. But on some level, one viewer of "Jersey Shore" counts as 10 viewers of any other show. [Variety]